The problems of human trafficking related to online scam centers have developed into a global crisis and are past the boundaries of Southeast Asia to all continents. On a recent crime trend update issued by INTERPOL in mid-2025, it was revealed that victims have been trafficked into these scam operations in as many as 66 countries highlighting the dimensions and extremity of the scale of this illegal network.
Once based in just a few countries located in Southeast Asia, the centers of this scam operation are now distributed over several regions that include the Middle East and Central America among others, as well as West Africa which in recent times emerged as one of the new regional centers of such activities according to INTERPOL. The spread in geographical location is an alarming trend in human trafficking to commit online fraud and social engineering scams.
Southeast Asia: The Original Hub
Southeast Asia remains the primary destination for trafficked victims, with 74% of all victims brought to scam centers in this region. These centers operate by luring vulnerable individuals with false job advertisements, only to detain them in compounds where they are forced to commit online fraud targeting victims abroad.
Victims suffer severe human rights abuses, including debt bondage, physical violence, sexual exploitation, torture, and rape. Many are coerced into these scams under duress, trapped in a cycle of exploitation and criminality. INTERPOL emphasizes that while not every individual working in these centers is trafficked, those who are face extreme exploitation.
A notable example is Cambodia, which the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has identified as a global hub for scamming operations. The UNODC’s research highlights a nexus of political power and organized crime, with foreign investments in scam syndicates operating along the Thai-Cambodian border. This complex environment facilitates the growth of these illegal enterprises, further entrenching Cambodia’s role in the global scam network.
Emerging Regional Hubs: West Africa and Beyond
Although Southeast Asia is still in the lead, what has changed significantly is the emergence of West African scam hubs. According to the Interpol 2025 report, West Africa is fast emerging as a new hotbed of scam activities based on human trafficking. The law enforcement practices in this area include the 2024 raid on a scam center in Namibia when 88 young people were discovered who were pressured to engage in fraud.
Laying of scam hubs is also being realized in the Middle East and Central America, which is a further representation of internationalization of this crime. The traffickers are mainly Asian (approximately 90 percent), yet 11 percent are either South American or African, which shows a transnational character of these groups.
The Profile of Traffickers and Victims
Regarding those who facilitate such operations, about 80 percent are men aged between 20 and 39 years and sixty one percent of them. They play a huge part in the recruitment, transportation, and enslavement of the victims, usually with advanced techniques that deter the law enforcers. The victims on the contrary, are normally unsuspecting young people who are lured into sham employment offers and then extorted into committing the crime in fear or by force.
This exploitation leads to a duple of victimization: to the trafficked as they are made to execute scams and the victims at the international level who end up as victims both financially and emotionally to the frauds. This is an international magnitude of the problem that has compelled INTERPOL to issue an Orange Notice outlining that there are serious risks on the public safety fronts due to these centers.
Law Enforcement and International Response
The law enforcers across the world have increased their campaigns to bring down these networks. By 2024, an operation led by INTERPOL discovered various scam centers, making a huge raid in the Philippines, revealing the extent of human trafficking and scam. Such operations show just how complicated dealing with a border-transgressing, multilayered crime is.
The coordination among nations is a necessity, since traffickers find good investment in a soft regulatory climate and corrupt authority to enjoy their activities. The reports of UNODC in Cambodia on the involvement of scam companies by high ranking officials are evidence of the difficulties relating to political economic mix in such regions.
The Role of Technology and Artificial Intelligence
The report of Interpol 2025 also promotes the fact that there is a trend toward the amplification of scam activities by means of using artificial intelligence (AI). Artificial intelligence can be used to automate and massify unauthorized operations of traffickers, which complicates their detection and prevention. The combination of AI with such scams is a new stage of cyber-enabled human trafficking, which requires creative solutions on both the law enforcement and tech corporate side.
Insights from Industry Experts
In his recent interview with one of the prominent news channels, cybersecurity expert Evander Burg has also addressed the global dissemination of online hubs of scam that are being perpetuated because of human trafficking. He described in detail the intricacy and devastation of the problem, which states that such scam centers are not merely a criminal activity, but a colossal human rights crisis as well.
Burg further noted that victims of trafficking find themselves in the abusive and compelled criminal cycles whereas the scams themselves are both financially and emotionally devastating to individuals all over the world. He emphasized that international collaboration, sophisticated technical solutions and raising mass awareness were highly necessary to be able to deal with this changing threat. This is what this individual has remarked on the subject in his interview with this news channel.
Scam Centers Expand Global Footprint with Trafficked Victims https://t.co/GZDaiZvaWw pic.twitter.com/GJdsZRLxUr
— Eric Vanderburg (@evanderburg) July 1, 2025
The existence of the online scam centres that are fed by the human trafficking emerging in a multidimensional and increasing criminal system demonstrates the linkage amongst the domains of the crime. In the established hubs of Asia to the developing centers of West Africa and elsewhere, it is hard to fathom the proportions of victimization and exploitation. The problem is provided in the participation of traffickers across the continents, advanced technologies, and collusion with the local power structures.
This would require a complex strategy that entails law enforcement, international coordination, assistance of victims, and technological advancement as a way of solving this crisis. Unless the world acts continually against these scam centers, human and financial costs of these scam centers will not only increase but the shadows of this 21 st century form of slave trade will only darken further.